Marketing boss in hour-long train rant at woman Chelsea supporter

A marketing executive left a football fan “paralysed in fear” when he subjected her to an hour-long torrent of abuse on the train back from a match.

Alasdair MacTavish, an AFC Wimbledon supporter, had watched his team’s 2-0 defeat to Rotherham United in Yorkshire on February 3 and was waiting at Doncaster for a train to King’s Cross.

The 41-year-old began hurling insults at people and continued his tirade on the train, abusing the entire carriage and making “sexual comments” towards women, British Transport Police said.

It prompted one woman, a mother and Chelsea fan, to intervene, asking MacTavish to stick to football banter. He began making threats and sexual comments towards her, continuing for more than an hour, the force said.

A passenger alerted the police, who arrested MacTavish in London. He was convicted of a public order offence at Westminster magistrates’ court, where he was served a football banning order, barring him from matches in England and Wales for three years. He was fined £570 and ordered to do 80 hours of community service and a 10-day sexual and alcohol rehabilitation course.

MacTavish’s LinkedIn describes him as a senior account director at Wimbledon-based creative agency Haygarth. At his £750,000 family home in Teddington, he told the Standard: “I apologised at the police station and I apologised in court. I have been as remorseful as I can. I just want to put this all behind me.”

Pc Rob Wortham said MacTavish had picked on the woman because she was a Chelsea fan. He said: “The constant abuse lasted for over an hour, which left the victim paralysed in fear.”

Haygarth boss Marcus Sandwith today said that McTavish is no longer an employee, having left the firm on February 8.